


Love Dripping Golden From A Honeycomb Heart

by Angel Ascending (angel_in_ink)



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Bees, Body Horror, Corruption!Martin, Happy Ending, M/M, Spoilers Through Episode 159
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-09
Updated: 2020-04-09
Packaged: 2021-03-01 23:14:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,137
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23555140
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angel_in_ink/pseuds/Angel%20Ascending
Summary: Martin tells Jon that Jane Prentiss had him trapped in his flat, tells him about the scratching and the whispers and the worms. He doesn’t tell Jon about the bees that seem to follow him now, that get tangled in his hair. They don’t sting Martin when he frees them, and seem reluctant to fly away. They crawl on his fingers instead, over the backs of his hands and up his arms.One morning he wakes up to find that his lips are sticky, feels the tickling sensation of a bee crawling along his tongue. That’s when he puts a hand on his chest, feels the buzzing drone underneath his palm. That’s when he understands he’ll never be alone again.
Relationships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan Sims
Comments: 53
Kudos: 357





	Love Dripping Golden From A Honeycomb Heart

No one notices, is the thing. Or, at least, Jon doesn’t notice, doesn’t know, not for years.

Martin tells Jon that Jane Prentiss had him trapped in his flat, tells him about the scratching and the whispers and the worms. He doesn’t tell Jon about the bees that seem to follow him now, that get tangled in his hair. They don’t sting Martin when he frees them, and seem reluctant to fly away. They crawl on his fingers instead, over the backs of his hands and up his arms.

One night when Martin is trying to sleep in the archives, he hears a buzzing next to his ear, a quiet drone that rises and falls like music, like a lullaby. His sleep is easy that night for the first time in a long time, and later, when he feels anxiety creeping across his skin, he hums the song the bee taught him until he feels calm again.

After the first night there are more bees. Martin doesn’t know how they’re getting into his room at the archive, or why they’re never there in the morning when he wakes up. He only hears them at night, only feels the weight of them, so slight but so many, on his skin in the dark. They don’t frighten him, and Martin isn’t frightened of the fact that they don’t frighten him. He doesn’t feel lonely at night anymore.

One morning he wakes up to find that his lips are sticky, feels the tickling sensation of a bee crawling along his tongue. That’s when he puts a hand on his chest, feels the buzzing drone underneath his palm. That’s when he understands where the bees go during the day. That’s when he understands he’ll never be alone again.

Martin doesn’t tell anyone, even though he feels sometimes like maybe he should. But then Jane attacks (her worms had hidden so well from his bees, hidden until it was too late) and after that he _can’t_. He can’t tell Jon and Tim, not when they both carry the scars from the worms on their skin. He can’t tell Sasha, the bees don’t trust her, say she’s different, say she’s changed, but Martin can’t figure out how, only that he feels uneasy around her now. They wouldn’t understand. They’d want to take his friends away, his little swarm of a family that had replaced his heart with honeycomb, and he’s afraid of what will happen if they try.

When Jon grows sullen and suspicious of them all, the bees in Martin’s chest produce more honey, as if trying to soothe the sting of Jon’s anger. Martin thinks about adding the honey to Jon’s tea. Would it calm him? Would it coat his throat and turn his irritation into something sweeter? Martin never finds out. Instead he pours his love into jars, labelling each of them carefully and placing them on the sills of the windows in his flat, where they can catch the sun, turning the light golden and warm.

“He’ll never love you,” Elias tells Martin as Martin sits at a desk and weeps, the air thick with the smell of burnt statements, Martin’s head still throbbing from the knowledge Elias had thrust into it, unasked and unwanted images of his mother still playing themselves out behind his eyes. “Do you even have room in your heart for him?”

The bees in Martin’s heart buzz quietly, made lazy by the smoke. Still, one makes it past Martin’s lips and stings Elias on the back of his hand, a small sacrifice, a tiny victory that is lost under a great tragedy. Later, at the hospital, Martin will cry sticky sweet tears as his bees swarm over Jon, as if the thunderous sound of their buzzing could wake him.

Martin _hates_ working with Peter, hates the clumsy way he tries to win Martin over to his side. As if Martin could ever be truly alone when his heart is so full. Still, he does what he has to to keep everyone safe, to keep _Jon_ safe, his own little colony of people. It’s only when the bet is lost and won, when Martin gets whisked into the Lonely, only then is he scared. The fog and cold creeps into his heart, puts his bees to sleep like smoke, makes them too tired to flap their wings to keep themselves warm. Martin curls into himself in the sand, for the first time in years unable to hear the buzz and hum of the hive.

“Martin?” Jon’s voice, as soft and soothing as the drone of his bees. “Martin, he’s gone.” There’s the sound of Jon kneeling in the sand, a hand warm on Martin’s shoulder.

“I can’t hear them,” Martin whispers. He doesn’t want to speak, to breathe, to let more of the cold in. He looks up at Jon. “Jon, I can’t hear them.”

“Martin, what—?” Jon’s eyes go wide for a moment, wide enough to fill the sky, the sea, the world. Martin feels Seen all the way down to his honeycomb heart, love dripping golden and beautiful and perfect. Love for his hive. Love for Jon. Love that Martin sees reflected back at him.

“Oh,” Jon says quietly, and then he’s taking Martin’s hand, holding him close. Martin clings to the warmth of him as the world shifts around them both, sand and sea air and damp fog replaced with floorboards and the smell of dust and sweetness. Martin hasn’t been to his flat in an age, but he knows that smell anywhere. Martin shivers, still cold, and his bees don’t stir, panic rising in his throat like a swarm.

Jon keeps holding Martin, his small frame wrapped around Martin’s larger one, his head against Martin’s chest. When Jon starts humming, Martin looks down in shock, because it’s the _song._ How does Jon know the _song?_

When the bees start humming back, when Martin feels the multitude of wings buzzing inside him, he weeps in relief, feels the bees crawl from him to drink his sweetened tears. By the time he finishes crying, the room is filled with bees, their golden bodies shimmering like motes of light, the sound of their buzzing the sound of the song.

“I always thought you had a rather sonorous hum,” Jon says, looking up at Martin. There are bees crawling on Jon’s tear stained cheeks, tangled in his hair. He’s never looked more beautiful. “I guess you had some help with that.”

“You don’t—“ Martin swallows and reaches down, brushing Jon’s cheek. The bee that had been crawling there obediently moves out of the way. “You don’t mind?”

Jon just smiles, and that smile is as bright and warm as the jars of honey in the window. “I guess I’ll just have to learn to share.”

**Author's Note:**

> I guess this is what happens when you're on season 2 of your Hannibal rewatch and you get to episode 4, "Takiawase", where the woman who lobotomizes people and puts bees in their head is like, the LEAST thing that happens in that episode, and your friend (Kris blaming you again) points out that it's a big Corruption mood. Also when one of your favorite movies is Candyman. Also when you really like bees.
> 
> I’m [angel-ascending](http://angel-ascending.tumblr.com) over on Tumblr and [angel_in_ink](http://twitter.com/angel_in_ink) over on Twitter if y’all want to stop by and say hi!


End file.
